Double Take Truths vs Beliefs: What Makes Some Human And Others Self-Serving Hypocrites

I saw a t-shirt with “Never Say Never” written on it and it made me smile because of my personal truism. It is “My only intolerance is intolerance”. My other double take truth is “What we all have in common is that we are each unique.” Some say what makes us human is the ability to hold two contradictory ideas at the same time. The double take truths above are such ideas. Yet, many think that holding contradictory beliefs makes them human but instead it just makes them self-serving hypocrites.

For example, many Christians believe worshiping Christ (his mystical side) and ignoring his teachings (his ethics) is being a devout Christian. This is not true. It makes them a half Christian. Thomas Jefferson rewrote the Bible and took out the mysticism and left only the ethics. It is how Jesus wanted us to behave. Most Christians do not behave this way.

Many hate their neighbors because they hate themselves. They assuage this self hate by giving money to a church and preachers promote this giving and self enrichment through “prosperity ministries.” Today these preachers would be thrown out of their “Temples” along with their “money changers” supporters by Jesus himself. These churches and their teachings are an abomination of Jesus’ life and death.

Though good deeds alone cannot get one into heaven, being good enough to get into heaven means by nature doing good deeds. It is paradoxical to be heaven good and not do good deeds. It is consistent to be an evil doer and attempt “good deeds” to make up for the evil deeds. Unfortunately, the so-called “good deeds” evil doers do are not truly good deeds since they are self centered and selfish. So, evil doers delude themselves.

These delusion are not limited to Christians. Islamic “Jihadist” a.k.a, terrorist, suicide bombers, etc. delude themselves into believing they are doing “good deeds” when they are actually being selfish. Is it not selfish to want a harem of “vestal virgins”? Is is not selfish and self-enriching to impose ones beliefs on others?

If the leaders of these Jihad movement are so committed why do they have to convince others (usually the poor and ignorant) to die for their cause? Why are they not suicide bombers themselves? The answer is they have too much to gain by letting others die for their beliefs. Deeds for self-enrichment whether monetary or otherwise are evil even in Islam.

Double take truths make many of us human while double take beliefs make many self-serving hypocrites. There are worlds of differences.